Remote work is now virtually standard practice with companies such as Shopify established as a fully remote business.

Working from home provides flexibility and can create a greater work-life balance. This often makes remote employees happier, increasing their productivity. However, there can also be some drawbacks. Since a lot of the communication is done via email, there’s room for miscommunication and difficulty in collaborating.

It might sound counter-intuitive, but that’s when team-building activities are the most beneficial.

Your employees don’t have to be in the same room for some fun and bonding virtual team building. Many team activities can be done remotely, such as trivia or team-building exercises. These can improve company culture, support your employees, and improve your business in the long run.

What is virtual team building?

Any type of game, small talk, or group activity unrelated to work can serve as remote team building. Activities like these often happen organically in a physical office. For example, teams might chat during lunch or coffee breaks, or they might go out for group activities after work.

Unlike employees sharing the same office space, remote team members often work solely in their own homes. Because of this, they may not discuss non-work topics as much as workers who see each other daily.

This means they might not be able to develop personal relationships as well as those working in a physical office space. Ultimately, this can lead to virtual teams feeling disconnected from one another.

However, virtual team activities can help workers feel like a part of a collective. They can make remote employees feel like they're part of the team and create bonds with fellow workers.

Why is virtual team building important?

A 2022 survey by Buffer gathered data about the State of Remote Work from over 2,000 participants. While many emphasise the benefits of working from home, there are several disadvantages that every business should take note of.

First, the survey found that 24% of people struggle with loneliness. Second, 21% responded that they have a hard time staying motivated.

Moreover, 17% of the respondents find it difficult to collaborate, while 15% find that working from home affects their career growth. Virtual team building activities help workers such as these feel more included, as well as many other benefits.

Employee morale

Employees, both remote and those in the office, can occasionally feel slumps, such as the February slump. This can be caused by everything from stressing over a project to feeling lonely when working from home.

During slumps like these, virtual team-building activities like online team games can help improve their mood. It gives them time to decompress during working hours, as well as improving a sense of camaraderie with other colleagues.

Employee connections and bonds

It’s easy to dismiss someone when they are just a name on an email or a muted video during a virtual team meeting. But when you start offering corporate team-building activities, your employees can learn to get to know each other and develop empathy in the process.

According to the World Economic Forum, making friends at work is important on multiple fronts. First, it can contribute to the employees’ happiness. Second, it helps the team feel more connected. Finally, employees with work friends are more engaged and thus more productive.

Employee retention

By organising virtual team-building activities, you can help strengthen the employees' bonds with each other. And the more people like their coworkers, the less they’ll want to leave. As Harvard Business Review found, 35% of people dissatisfied with their job will choose to stay in their roles if they have good personal friends there.

Virtual activities also show them the company cares about them as people, not just as employees. This can be helpful if you feel your company is suffering from “the great break-up”.

Employee engagement and collaboration

Thanks to connections created in remote team-building activities, it will be easier for colleagues to come to each other for help. They no longer feel like strangers and can rely on others more.

Some remote team games focus on improving communication and collaboration. They are designed to learn how to deal with conflict and resolve it amicably.

Improved productivity

When your employees feel respected and cared for, they'll naturally work together better as a team. This means they'll communicate better and start acting like a better team. When they start communicating with each other like a community, improved productivity will naturally follow.

H2: Best practices for team bonding while working remotely

It’s important to come prepared before you schedule your first team-building exercise for work. Here are the ways you can contribute to the success of your next team building.

1. Equipment for the team building session

Virtual team building takes place online, so you'll need the right tech to accommodate it. This is especially important as Millenials and GenZ are tech-savvy and expect their employer to be the same.

Determine where the meeting will take place, such as on Zoom or Skype, and ensure everyone has access to the app. Naturally, each participant should have working microphones and cameras, which should both be on during the activity. After all, without active participants, there's no point in the team-building activity in the first place.

Finally, take a run-through before the event to check that everything is working on your end. For example, ensure that screen sharing, videos, and microphones are working for everyone across the board.

You don’t want virtual team-building games to feel like a burden. If you schedule them right before a tight deadline or during an important project, that’s exactly how they’ll feel.

With global companies, finding a slot to accommodate all time zones may be hard. You should be mindful of your team's working hours, which could also include commitments like school pick-ups. Try to factor these in when finding the right time for everyone.

Think about what you want to achieve with your team-building activities. The best activities will be the ones that have a specific purpose. The goal can be improving communication, getting to know new employees, or simply having fun. Whatever the goal is, it's vital to have one in mind when planning your team building.

After deciding on that, let the purpose dictate a plan. It doesn’t have to be a list of bullet points, a script, and a presentation. You should always ensure you've got a plan in place, something you can rely on to stay on track.

While it’s crucial to have a structure, it’s just as vital to allow small talk. You can add that as a standard at the beginning of any regular meeting and also before starting the team-building activities.

This is a time when the team members get to know what’s happening in each other’s lives, which can strengthen their bonds even further.

Team-building activities for work are meant to be entertaining, so you should try and enjoy yourself while planning them out. More importantly, it should be fun for your team.

For example, if everyone watches reality TV shows regularly, you can organise an office trivia game to see who knows the most about the show.

Not every team manager is a natural at leading team activities. It takes a different set of skills to get employees talking and having fun. If you can’t find a facilitator, you can always hire an external company to do it for you. They will be prepared with games and an organised plan.

There is also the option to create a dedicated team inside the company, with people who enjoy organising and public speaking.

The best way to make an excellent virtual team-building meeting is to ask your employees what they like. You can take a poll before you plan it with a few options on offer.

More importantly, after you finish the meeting, ensure you ask the team members what they liked and didn’t like about the activity. Then apply that to future plans.

When to incorporate team building

To get the most out of remote team-building events, it’s best to have them regularly. A one-off is not enough to create long-lasting relationships.

Here are some suggestions for incorporating these into your business calendar:

• When you get a group of new hires: team building will help new employees to get to know their colleagues and feel welcome. However, grouping them is best so that no employee feels singled out
• Add time before a weekly meeting: you can add 15 to 30 minutes beforehand as a regular event for team building. This will give the team time for small talk
• Set a monthly team building: for longer team-building events, set a regular meeting. This way, people know they have something to look forward to
• Yearly virtual team building days: just like the more traditional “away days,” you can set a whole day dedicated to team building online once a year

Team building ideas for remote teams that everyone can get involved with

Now that we’ve covered the process of virtual team-building activities from start to finish, it’s time to discuss team-building games. As we’ve mentioned, there are endless possibilities.

Here are a few common remote team games you can use to get started and get you thinking creatively.

This is one of the most popular team-building activities. It requires almost no preparation and usually doesn’t take too long, either. The game's main point is to get people comfortable with each other.

This is why it’s also good for the beginning of meetings or when there’s a new person in the team.

Two truths and lie

This is a common ice-breaker that usually gets people laughing. Get each participant to tell two facts about themselves and one lie. It can be anything from a hobby to places they visited or a unique skill. The others will need to figure out the lie and will have a fun time in the process.

Quick questions

Ask everyone to get a piece of paper and give them a series of questions where they have to write their answers in under 10 seconds. These can be things like “What superpower would you like to have?” or “What food would you eat for a month straight?”

In the end, get each person to read out their answers to see if there’s a common thread or any interesting responses.

Everyday pictures

Before the meeting, ask the participants to take a picture of something in their life that’s important to them. It could be anything, such as their pet, a hobby, or their favourite food. At the beginning of the meeting, have them show the picture and explain why they chose it.

If your team tends to have friction and arguments, you may want to select games specifically designed to improve cooperation. In general, every competition that divides the employees into teams can do. However, here are a few of our suggestions.

This one is more about communication, as it can help your employees learn about each other’s personalities. Ask the attendees to complete the test before the event and write down their results.

At the meeting, each member will reveal what they received. The facilitator will then discuss what that means about their personality type. This includes the way they work, their communication style, and what strengths they can bring to the team.

Zero to hero

This is an excellent game for conflict resolution. With the help of the Zoom breakout rooms, divide the meetings into groups of two. Ask each pair to talk about a negative event that happened to them in the past.

Then the other person should find the positive aspect of the situation and explain it back to them. Then they switch. When they’re done, every group discusses their process with the meeting and what they learned.

If you are simply looking for fun ways to get your team socialising, there are endless options here, such as

• Online team games: attendees can play these games on their phones and see the results on the shared screen. This includes everything from drawing games to trivia
• Virtual happy hour: like in real life, having drinks together can be a bonding experience. Have employees cheers together in front of the screen at the end of the day. You can even set some ice-breakers to get the conversation going
• Cooking competitions: since everyone works from home, they’re probably cooking as well, so you can make this fun as well. Set a time when everyone has to cook together and then present their creations. Then, everyone can eat together

Small team-building activities are usually ones that take a bit longer. In some cases, virtual games may have a more complex task that limits gameplay to a certain number of people.

Games that require large amounts of creativity with feedback from the rest of the group may prove difficult to manage in larger groups.

Small groups can also benefit from games where they dig deep and get to know each other. For example, in a virtual escape room, team members not only get quality time but also learn crucial problem-solving skills.

When it comes to large groups, ice-breakers are a great option. Since these are quick, rapid-fire questions, each person can get a chance to partake. However, if you have too many people to participate, there are a few options.

One is to divide the meeting into smaller teams that compete against each other. The other option is to do something more passive, like virtual happy hour, virtual movie night, or even hire a comedian for a virtual performance.

Build a stronger, more collaborative team

With the help of the right virtual team-building strategies, you can help your remote team become better than any other. It’s just a matter of creativity and persistence.

With each team-building event that you conduct, take what worked and run with the conclusions for the next one. And don’t be scared to ask for external help if you need it.

However, if you still feel that your team can benefit from some face-to-face interactions, remember that there are ways to do that as well. You can always rent a meeting room for a day to host a company event.

Our virtual office package has that option as an add-on, as well as access to lounges and breakout areas in our offices. Talk to us today and make an enquiry to see how Regus can help you work your way.